Last week's rescue of Savings Bank reflected badly on the whole industry, but also showed that the Mongolians are committed to bailing out international investors.

The failure of Mongolia’s Savings Bank last week is dividing opinion on the creditworthiness of the country’s banking industry.

Savings Bank was the fifth-biggest lender in Mongolia with a market share of about 8% before the Bank of Mongolia stepped in on July 22 and declared it insolvent, transferring all of its equity, liabilities and good assets to the much smaller State Bank of Mongolia, a government-owned lender. The central bank took over its bad...